Would Anyone really Miss Crocs? Mario Batali would!

I'm calling it the Crocs phenomena but it could just as easily be called the Starbucks dilema. Crocs, like many companies over the last decade over expanded and came out with too many product lines (Starbucks thought we needed a coffee shop on every corner! They should probably be focused on making better coffee, but that's a different topic all together). Crocs which started out making durable outdoor, non-slip shoes now makes these...

Really!?!? You went from boating/outdoor shoes to high heeled, hideously ugly womans shoes? Who made that business decision...

So, here Crocs sits with significantly lower sales and hundreds of millions in debt. There share price which once traded at $68 now trades around $1. "In its annual report, Crocs said that auditor Deloitte & Touche expressed "substantial doubt" about the company's ability to continue as a going concern."

http://www.cfo.com/article.cfm/13315331

What started out as a local fad in Boulder spread like wildfire for reasons beyond my understanding and It's now catching up to them.

I guess the sad thing in all of this is that if they weren't greedy and looked at long term profitability along with the long term viability of the company they would probably be doing just fine. Companies tried to expand as quickly as possible to inflate the share prices. It's a risky venture that we are seeing rarely pays off.

In the end, i wouldn't miss Crocs if they disappeared tomorrow.

Personal side note: I used to lived directly above one of the founders of Crocs. He had 3 cars all with custom license plates that said "Crocs 1, Crocs 2, Crocs 3" The guy was a raging alcoholic and i always wondered how a guy like that could possibly run or help run a successful company. Turns out he can't.

Update #1: Mario Batali looks like his Crocs (thanks for pointing this out Matt!)